In the building arts, insulation of exterior walls is an important design consideration, particularly in northern or extreme climates.
One building system found in the art is an exterior cladding system comprising a framework structure coupled to the exterior wall with exterior cladding panels connected to the framework. The exterior cladding panels can be engineered and fabricated to provide various aesthetic characteristics in addition to useful thermal and weather resistant properties. For example, the cladding panels and frame structure can comprise a rear ventilated rain-screen (RVRS) exterior wall structure.
A shortcoming with these types of systems is the connection between the exterior cladding framework structure and the exterior wall provides a thermal path for the escape of thermal energy, e.g. heat in winter and cooled air in summer. In addition, building code requirements are increasingly specifying improved thermal characteristics. For instance, the current industry standard for attachment of cladding type systems is inefficient in terms of effective R-Value. Compared to the nominal amount of insulation used in the assembly, the thermal resistance of the continuous vertical girt or continuous horizontal girt is typically only 40-60% effective. Therefore, typical traditional systems do not meet the prescriptive requirements of the national building code.
Accordingly, there remains a need for improvements in the art.